Kikuchi Kan/Trivia
* He died at age 59 due to coronary heart disease. * His real name is Kikuchi Hiroshi, using the same kanji. Akutagawa Ryuunosuke also named his first son after Kikuchi's real name. * Kikuchi founded the magazine Bungeishunjuu with his own fund in 1923, which had been a big hit and generated a great deal of wealth for him. * In 1926, he also founded Japan Writers' Association - a professional organization that protects freedom of speech and advocates stable livelihood for writers and dramatists, without taking any political stance. At present, their activities have been extended to artists in general and provided copyright protection for copyright successors as well as non-members. * Kitahara Hakushuu was antagonistic against Kikuchi due to the rivalry in 1927 between the publishers that they represented. * In 1935, Kikuchi established Akutagawa Ryuunosuke Prize (shortened as Akutagawa Prize) and Naoki Sanjuugo Prize (shortened as Naoki Prize) on the magazine Bungeishunjuu in memory of two said writers who were also his personal friends. Akutagawa Prize is aimed at nameless or rising novelists in the category of short stories and novellas; Naoki Prize was intended for newcomers in the category of popular fiction at first, but later extended to even older writers. * Kikuchi also proposed and created a literary prize named after himself in honor of senior writers' achievements, aimed at writers who are 46 years old or older, with a judge panel formed by writers younger than 45. Tokuda Shuusei, Satomi Ton, Mushanokouji Saneatsu, Muroo Saisei, Satou Haruo, and Kawabata Yasunari were among pre-war prize-winners. * As the first president of Daiei Co. and a guest member of Houchi Shimbun, he made a fortune thanks to their success and provided financial support to rising writers such as Yokomitsu Riichi, Kawabata Yasunari, and Kobayashi Hideo. ** Daiei Co. later produced a movie adaptation named after Akutagawa's "Rashoumon", with the plot and the characters taken from another work by Akutagawa, "In a Grove". * According to his wife, Kikuchi had been someone who loved taking care of people, but he hated it when people looked after him. * Kikuchi was an enthusiast for mahjoing, horse racing, and shogi. He even served as the first president of Japan Mahjong League. During his time as Daiei president, shogi became trendy in the company due to his influence and the top managers were compelled to get themselves into shogi as well. ** His anagram, Kuchikikan (also understood as "unyielding mouth), was used by his opponents in reference to his bad habit to get sulky and keep his mouth shut as he was losing in mahjong matches. * Hasegawa Machiko, the author of the well-known 4-koma series Sazae-san, mentioned in her autobiography manga that when her family was reduced to poverty to due the living expense demands after coming to Tokyo, a friend showed Kikuchi Hasegawa's older sister's drawings and Kikuchi recruited her as the illustrator for his own works. Later, when Kikuchi was shown Hasegawa's younger sister's writing, he told her to quit college and take her as his live-in student. The younger sister eventually joined the magazine Bungeishunjuu, but she had to quit the job regretably due to pleuritis. * According to Hasegawa's sister, Kikuchi sometimes wore two watches, at times appeared with his kimono sash trailing behind, and tended to bare his chest since he sweated a lot which often enabled heat rash and you would see thick rolls of bank notes peeking through. ** Iwaya Daishi and Ibuse Masuji had a similar statement, that Kikuchi stuffed many banknotes in every pocket of his kimono and would casually give them away to poor writers once asked. When Ibuse traveled with Ozaki Shirou (who was also Kawabata Yasunari's close friend) and encountered Kikuchi in the same lodging place, Kikuchi forced his notes onto them despite that they told him they had money.